Gps Success Story

[aPeacefulWarrior]

I just got my eTrex Legend with mapsource about a week ago and I am really enjoying it. Here is something that happened to me a few days ago that confirmed that my investment was well worth it.

 

I went to an unfamiliar town pretty far away from where I live. I had never really been there before, and wanted to test my gps in such a setting. I wanted to spend the day geocaching, but I forgot to enter their coordinates before I left! I couldn't believe it! So I thought I was screwed. Then I thought hmm... if only I had access to the internet... wait a minute! I have a Legend with mapsource! So I went to find and ask it for the location of the nearest library. Only about a mile away. It brought me right to it, and there I was able to look up the coords and geocache for the rest of the day. I was very proud! And it looks like I tested my gps even more then I was planning. It works great!

 

Thats my success story!

[+tirediron]

Very cool!

[+Desert_Warrior]

I use GPS (and ham radio) to capture weather balloons.

 

There are a number of National Weather Service (NWS) stations around the USA that release weather balloons twice a day. These balloons have weather instruments, a radio transmitter, and a parachute. The NWS captures and decodes the data for the flight till the balloon explodes at about 100,000 feet. Then the package falls back to earth on the parachute. The data gets posted on the internet.

 

Using ham radio equipment and techniques, we track the package by radio direction finding. When the balloon pops and the NWS posts the flight data on the internet. A ham at home downloads the data and processes it, then calls us on the air with the condensed flight data for us. Knowing this flight data, and using a program developed by hams for hams, we can predict the landing zone.

 

We program the lat/lon into the GPSr, but still track via radio signals. It is interesting to see how accurate the predicted landing vs actual landing is. I have seen errors from 1/4 mile to 12 miles. We have captured 3 of the 4 we went after last weekend.

 

And now you know why I don't have time for a lot of caching. Too much fun doing other stuff!

[aPeacefulWarrior]

Wow, thats really amazing! What do you do with the packages after you retrieve them?

[+writer]

There are a number of National Weather Service (NWS) stations around the USA that release weather balloons twice a day.

Do they do this all over the country, or just in your area?

[+Team Thompson]

Don't they re-use the equipment? You could be on the road to the strangest felony conviction ever!!!

[+Pobre Rico]

About 20 years ago, when I lived in Salem, OR, I went out to get the paper one morning and found one in my front yard. It had information on what it was and how to return it.

[+SomewhereInND]

I would imagine a lot of them get caught in powerlines.

[+JMBella]

I use GPS (and ham radio) to capture weather balloons.

 

There are a number of National Weather Service (NWS) stations around the USA that release weather balloons twice a day.  These balloons have weather instruments, a radio transmitter, and a parachute.  The NWS captures and decodes the data for the flight till the balloon explodes at about 100,000 feet.  Then the package falls back to earth on the parachute.  The data gets posted on the internet.

 

Using ham radio equipment and techniques, we track the package by radio direction finding. When the balloon pops and the NWS posts the flight data on the internet.  A ham at home downloads the data and processes it, then calls us on the air with the condensed flight data for us.  Knowing this flight data, and using a program developed by hams for hams, we can predict the landing zone.

 

We program the lat/lon into the GPSr, but still track via radio signals.  It is interesting to see how accurate the predicted landing vs actual landing is.  I have seen errors from 1/4 mile to 12 miles.  We have captured 3 of the 4 we went after last weekend.

 

And now you know why I don't have time for a lot of caching.  Too much fun doing other stuff! 

That sounds like a blast! How would I find out if there is a weather station near me that releases them? It would be interesting to make weather balloon captures part of this site. Like they don't already have enough to worry about. They could have their own section like benchmarks.

 

Sorry PeacefulWarrior, your story is really cool too!

Edited May 22, 2004 by JMBella

[davwil]

Congratulations to apeacefulwarrior

 

I think the "light" just went on....

 

It takes some thought about how one can use any technology. When you can use it creatively (as you did) we all have learned something.

 

I'm going to use some of the features of my Map76 that I haven't used before in the same way.

 

I don't know what the heck some of those other people are talking about?

 

Dave

Edited May 22, 2004 by davwil

[+katguy]

I found one of these radiosondes once while searching for a cache. I grabbed thinking it was CITO material, but then saw the NOAA markings. Attached to it was a postage paid baggie to return it in. It was very cool. Just fill in the blanks for time and location found (wondered how often they got lat/lon responses rather than just nearest town), pop it in the bag, and drop in a mailbox. Don't know how useful mine was going to be - I think it had been there about 3 years before I found it.

[+Desert_Warrior]

Let's see. They do this all over the country. All over the world I would bet. There are about 100+ stations in the USA releasing them. Go to THIS PAGE to see where the nearest station may be to you.

 

Mostly the package can be reused. However, once they are launched, salvage rights apply. If it is a new model, we usually keep a few as souvineers, disassemble a few to refine our receiver specs , then start sending them back after that.

 

Look for a program called balloon track by Bull Brown. If you take the sounding data as a text file and process it in balloon track, you can get an idea where they are landing. We have seen errore of 1/4 mile to 12 miles.

 

The weather service really does not care where it lands. In fact, the data they collect up to 100 milibars pressure altitude is all they care about. 100mb is about 50,000 feet. Typically, a balloon goes over 100,000 feet before the balloon bursts.

 

NOTE: The next generation transmitters will have a GPSr built in, and will send a digitally encoded bit stream with the lat/lon data encoded. We are already looking at ways to capture that data to more refine our operation.

 

Sorry for the delay in answering. I was in a car accident. My jeep has some damage to the rear where I got hit, but would be drivable if it were not for the gas tank leaks. The other car is really destroyed. 1976 jeep is real steel!